WEBVTT 00:00:07.759 --> 00:00:09.599 You're listening to the road. 00:00:09.919 --> 00:00:11.919 After teachers, Steve Holmes. 00:00:12.560 --> 00:00:26.640 The more you focus on the beautiful and the positive and the goodness and the grace and the healing and the supernatural love of God, the more your faith grows, and the more you get out of the fear narrative. 00:00:26.960 --> 00:00:31.920 But some of you, your identity is a little too much in fear. 00:00:32.079 --> 00:00:33.439 That's who you are. 00:00:33.679 --> 00:00:45.359 And I'm gonna challenge you that it's gonna take some work, it's gonna take some work for you to say to yourself, I'm not gonna camp there anymore, even though my circumstances don't care. 00:00:46.880 --> 00:00:52.479 At the road, our vision is to raise up wholehearted disciples of Jesus Christ. 00:00:52.719 --> 00:00:56.960 For more information on the road, visit theroad.org. 00:00:57.200 --> 00:01:02.240 We hope you are encouraged by today's message from Pastor Teacher Steve Holt. 00:01:05.680 --> 00:01:10.480 God is moving mountains in many of your lives. 00:01:10.959 --> 00:01:15.439 God is doing things that you never expected. 00:01:15.760 --> 00:01:21.200 If he's not, I want to challenge you today that that is what God does. 00:01:21.280 --> 00:01:29.439 And it's probably the most beautiful definition of God is that he moves mountains and that and that he does the unexpected in our life. 00:01:29.519 --> 00:01:36.239 He's a miracle-working God, but he's working with your mind, church. 00:01:36.480 --> 00:01:38.640 He's working with our mind, church. 00:01:38.879 --> 00:01:45.760 Do you realize that we have 80,000 thoughts a day, and 90% of them are exactly the same as the day before? 00:01:46.159 --> 00:01:52.959 Because you have these ruts in your mind, you have these ruts that run through in your mind and your frontal cortex, and they don't change. 00:01:53.120 --> 00:02:00.000 And it takes effort on your part to renew your mind, to change your thinking. 00:02:00.239 --> 00:02:07.920 And sometimes we're missing the miraculous, we're missing the supernatural work of God because we've become so accustomed with the natural. 00:02:08.560 --> 00:02:19.680 And church to us is just religion, it's not a dynamic encounter with the living, supernatural, miracle-working, healing God. 00:02:20.240 --> 00:02:22.479 And so you have to change your thinking. 00:02:23.039 --> 00:02:26.159 So today I want to talk about the beauty of God again. 00:02:26.560 --> 00:02:30.400 Because I'm captivated by the beauty of God. 00:02:31.039 --> 00:02:47.840 You can be captivated by the beauty of God, and one of the most powerful things we can do in our lives to get out of our thinking rut is to begin to meditate on, think about, study, and worship the beauty of God. 00:02:48.000 --> 00:02:50.639 It's all around us. 00:02:51.280 --> 00:02:58.560 So your feelings, your feelings, how you feel, are the emotions of your body. 00:02:59.120 --> 00:03:04.000 But how you think are the emotions of your brain. 00:03:04.719 --> 00:03:12.479 So if you want your emotions to change, usually you have something that you do that makes you emotionally happy. 00:03:12.719 --> 00:03:18.560 If you want the emotions of your mind to change, you've got to renew your mind. 00:03:18.639 --> 00:03:20.800 You've got to think differently. 00:03:21.199 --> 00:03:28.000 I had an encounter with the beauty of God as a freshman in college. 00:03:28.159 --> 00:03:34.879 So I'd gotten saved, I'd come to know the Lord, I was sharing my faith, I was in a Bible study, I was growing. 00:03:35.120 --> 00:03:49.120 And one day I was walking from my dorm to biology class, and I know exactly where it was on the University of Georgia campus when something came over me, it was the Holy Spirit. 00:03:49.360 --> 00:03:52.960 I would call it something back then, I would call it the Holy Spirit today. 00:03:53.199 --> 00:03:59.919 Holy Spirit came upon me, and I had a baptism of the beauty of God. 00:04:00.159 --> 00:04:02.879 You've heard about the baptism of the Holy Spirit. 00:04:03.199 --> 00:04:05.360 You've heard about water baptism. 00:04:05.520 --> 00:04:17.120 This was a baptism into the beauty of God, and I looked around and I just started weeping. 00:04:17.600 --> 00:04:22.240 Seriously, I must have really looked like I was an idiot and that I was losing my mind. 00:04:22.399 --> 00:04:26.000 But I remember going up to a tulip poplar tree. 00:04:26.160 --> 00:04:29.759 Some of you may know what a tulip poplar is, but tulip poplar is very popular. 00:04:36.000 --> 00:04:39.360 My grandmother loved tulip poplars, my mom loved tulips, I know it's tulip poplar. 00:04:39.519 --> 00:04:44.480 So I remember going up and just going, wow, look at this leaf. 00:04:45.120 --> 00:04:48.000 Fortunately, no one that I knew was around me. 00:04:49.360 --> 00:04:51.199 How many have seen Amazing Grace? 00:04:51.439 --> 00:04:53.040 The story of William Wilberforce. 00:04:53.279 --> 00:04:53.920 Remember that part? 00:04:54.000 --> 00:05:04.000 I just love that part where he's out in the field and his servant comes out and he thinks he's losing his mind, and he's just, he's just entranced by a spider web, I think. 00:05:04.079 --> 00:05:06.319 And it's just that's what it was like for me. 00:05:06.399 --> 00:05:10.639 And it lasted for about 10 minutes, and then it was gone. 00:05:10.720 --> 00:05:11.839 It lifted. 00:05:12.240 --> 00:05:14.879 But it was a baptism into the beauty of God. 00:05:14.959 --> 00:05:24.959 And I don't know if it began then or later, but there was a there was a new awareness of God's art gallery after that. 00:05:25.199 --> 00:05:28.000 There was a new awareness of God's art gallery. 00:05:28.079 --> 00:05:29.439 You know what God's art gallery is? 00:05:29.600 --> 00:05:30.639 It's creation. 00:05:30.959 --> 00:05:33.519 And you guys know we went to Japan and we went to Japan. 00:05:33.600 --> 00:05:43.759 I used to, this sounds almost like something kind of, I don't know, heretical to say, but I used to love to go to Buddhist temples. 00:05:43.839 --> 00:05:48.879 I'm a Christian missionary, but I used to love to go to Buddhist temples to spend time with the Lord. 00:05:50.240 --> 00:05:51.600 I know that sounds weird. 00:05:51.839 --> 00:05:54.160 Is the presence of God around Buddhist temples? 00:05:54.240 --> 00:05:54.879 I don't know. 00:05:55.040 --> 00:05:58.879 But the presence of God was around bamboo forest. 00:05:59.199 --> 00:06:02.079 And I still love bamboo forests wherever I can find them. 00:06:02.240 --> 00:06:04.879 You don't find them very often in Colorado, let me tell you that right now. 00:06:05.120 --> 00:06:09.680 But I would go into these bamboo forests that I think the monks may have planted. 00:06:09.759 --> 00:06:12.560 I don't know, but they were always around Buddhist temples and stuff. 00:06:12.720 --> 00:06:17.360 And I would get in there, and here's all these bamboo, and you get in and you couldn't see anything, and I would just get in there. 00:06:17.439 --> 00:06:22.720 Because remember, I'm living in the second largest city in the world at that time in Tokyo. 00:06:22.879 --> 00:06:25.519 There was no escaping people, they were everywhere. 00:06:25.680 --> 00:06:31.519 And I would just go in there and I'd get into that bamboo forest and just and just spend time with the Lord. 00:06:31.839 --> 00:06:36.879 And the intimacy that I felt and the closeness with him through his word and through worship. 00:06:37.120 --> 00:06:38.879 And back then I had a hymnal. 00:06:38.959 --> 00:06:39.920 I still have that hymnal. 00:06:40.000 --> 00:06:42.560 It's a little red hymnal, and I'd sing worship songs. 00:06:42.800 --> 00:06:52.959 So I don't know if there's ever any monks in Tokyo that say, man, there's some there's some sounds coming out of our bamboo forest that sound very foreign to me. 00:06:53.839 --> 00:06:57.199 And I guess for them it'd be like someone was speaking in tongues. 00:06:57.519 --> 00:06:59.040 Because it was in English. 00:06:59.680 --> 00:07:09.120 And then being on a river, fly fishing, and the steam coming off the river and the mountains in the background, or a deer crossing over. 00:07:10.959 --> 00:07:12.480 Beauty's all around us. 00:07:13.120 --> 00:07:19.199 This this beauty narrative that we have to begin to experience. 00:07:20.319 --> 00:07:25.839 Saint Augustine, I came across this prayer of Saint Augustine. 00:07:27.040 --> 00:07:30.240 Listen to what he says in the fourth century. 00:07:31.360 --> 00:07:49.600 He is beautiful in heaven and beautiful on earth and beautiful in the womb and beautiful in his parents' arms, beautiful in his miracles, beautiful in inviting us to life, beautiful in not worrying about death, beautiful in giving us his life, and beautiful in taking it up again. 00:07:49.839 --> 00:07:55.360 He is beautiful on the cross, beautiful in the tomb, and beautiful in heaven. 00:08:00.160 --> 00:08:01.439 Beauty has a name. 00:08:02.399 --> 00:08:03.600 Beauty has a name. 00:08:04.560 --> 00:08:05.839 His name is Jesus. 00:08:07.040 --> 00:08:14.160 One of the most beautiful things that we do at this church is we take the Lord's Supper together. 00:08:15.279 --> 00:08:23.680 And we're not very good in the Protestant Church at explaining the beauty of the Eucharist or communion. 00:08:23.759 --> 00:08:27.040 The Orthodox Church does it better in many ways, and so does the Catholic Church. 00:08:27.120 --> 00:08:30.319 I think the Lutheran Church that I came out of does it very well too. 00:08:31.040 --> 00:08:39.600 But the beauty of the table is that what we're doing, guys, is we're celebrating the life, death, and resurrection of Christ. 00:08:40.399 --> 00:08:41.759 You're taking the body. 00:08:41.919 --> 00:08:51.679 And I'm not, I don't believe in transubstantiation, where the body literally of Jesus becomes the bread, or the blood of Jesus literally becomes the juice. 00:08:52.159 --> 00:09:00.559 But I do believe in what we call consubstantiation, and that's the idea that the presence of God is mysteriously there. 00:09:01.759 --> 00:09:09.679 1 Corinthians 11 seems to indicate that those who take the Eucharist wrongly, some have even died. 00:09:10.159 --> 00:09:15.440 That's how holy and how beautiful it is to God that we take this. 00:09:15.519 --> 00:09:17.360 That's why we do it every week. 00:09:18.000 --> 00:09:23.039 So the beauty of the Eucharist, the beauty of our building. 00:09:23.360 --> 00:09:25.919 The building here matters to God. 00:09:26.320 --> 00:09:27.440 It really does. 00:09:27.759 --> 00:09:43.039 The beauty of this stage and the way Michael and his team have artistically crafted it and rounded it off was a picture we talked, we talked for hours about how we can make the sanctuary of God beautiful. 00:09:43.360 --> 00:09:46.240 That when people come in, there's no distractions. 00:09:46.559 --> 00:10:00.559 That we could that we could alleviate as many distractions as possible so that we at the road at Chapel Hills can come into the beauty, experience the beauty, and love the beauty that has a name. 00:10:00.879 --> 00:10:02.320 Jesus Christ. 00:10:02.879 --> 00:10:13.200 My wife and many others worked so hard on the lobby to put up all those all those pictures in the lobby are photos taken by a gal in our church. 00:10:13.440 --> 00:10:16.559 We didn't like take those off some image off the internet. 00:10:16.799 --> 00:10:20.080 Those are pictures we took that someone in our church took. 00:10:20.639 --> 00:10:25.200 Because we wanted it to be beautiful to all of us as you come in, you'd feel the beauty. 00:10:25.360 --> 00:10:31.840 You'd experience the beauty that would set your heart as you come through the lobby for a beautiful worship time. 00:10:32.720 --> 00:10:34.320 And the beauty of donuts. 00:10:40.159 --> 00:10:40.799 Amen. 00:10:45.440 --> 00:10:46.159 Says this. 00:10:46.320 --> 00:10:47.279 I love this. 00:10:47.840 --> 00:10:51.679 Within the beautiful, the whole person quivers. 00:10:53.120 --> 00:10:58.320 Within the beautiful, the whole person quivers. 00:10:59.120 --> 00:11:04.159 Now that's the way I felt when I first saw Liz, but I'm not going to elaborate on that. 00:11:05.440 --> 00:11:14.320 When you see beauty, when you experience beauty, even your emotions are touched. 00:11:15.279 --> 00:11:27.440 So turn in your Bibles to Psalm 27 because David is trying to challenge us to an understanding of the importance of beauty. 00:11:27.759 --> 00:11:30.720 Beauty is a powerful pointer to truth. 00:11:31.120 --> 00:11:33.759 The hard sciences are discovering this. 00:11:34.000 --> 00:11:47.120 In the news story of science, Robert Ogros and George Stansou develop the growing conviction that in the sciences, and perhaps most of all in physics, beauty is considered. 00:11:47.200 --> 00:11:49.919 Now listen to this, this is really fascinating. 00:11:50.240 --> 00:12:03.360 Beauty is considered the most powerful pointer to truth in a theory, even more important than the experiment that they're going to do. 00:12:03.759 --> 00:12:12.240 They're finding that the elegance of an equation is often better evidence of its truth than the experiment itself. 00:12:12.799 --> 00:12:23.440 They write, quote, all of the most eminent physicists of the 20th century agree that beauty is the primary standard for scientific truth. 00:12:24.559 --> 00:12:34.720 Richard Feeman, Nobel Prize winner, writes, You can recognize truth by its beauty and its simplicity. 00:12:35.519 --> 00:12:44.559 In Thomas Dubay's book, The Evidential Power of Beauty, he has a whole chapter on how you define beauty. 00:12:44.720 --> 00:12:49.679 And one of the definitions is about six, but one of the definitions is simplicity. 00:12:50.240 --> 00:13:08.240 And what they're finding in physics, what they're finding in microbiology, and what they're finding in mathematics is the simpler the equation, the simpler the solution, the more beautiful the solution, the simplicity of it all points to the fact that that's true. 00:13:08.480 --> 00:13:10.879 It's pointing them to truth. 00:13:11.120 --> 00:13:17.440 Men and women, there is a revival happening in the hard sciences right now. 00:13:17.600 --> 00:13:19.759 They do not know what to do. 00:13:20.720 --> 00:13:22.799 Some of these guys are atheists. 00:13:22.960 --> 00:13:23.679 I love this quote. 00:13:23.759 --> 00:13:24.799 I think I've got it here. 00:13:24.960 --> 00:13:26.080 This is great. 00:13:26.399 --> 00:13:28.240 Where'd I put that quote? 00:13:29.120 --> 00:13:30.320 About atheist. 00:13:31.519 --> 00:13:32.080 G.K. 00:13:32.240 --> 00:13:40.960 Chesterton said this how frustrating it must be for the atheist to be struck with the beauty of reality and have no one to thank for it. 00:13:41.120 --> 00:13:42.000 Isn't that great? 00:13:42.080 --> 00:13:43.039 I love that. 00:13:44.879 --> 00:13:52.720 But what they're finding, church, is that as they study mathematics, let's just take, for example, the butterfly. 00:13:52.960 --> 00:14:10.799 As they study the butterfly, it's actually a mathematical formula that fascinates mathematicians with the way in which the wings move on a butterfly and how perfect they are, and it always, they say, points to truth. 00:14:12.000 --> 00:14:15.200 God has set it up that way. 00:14:15.440 --> 00:14:24.480 He's evangelizing physicists through butterflies, he's evangelizing mathematicians through math. 00:14:24.960 --> 00:14:26.799 How many hate math? 00:14:27.279 --> 00:14:28.879 How many love math? 00:14:29.200 --> 00:14:30.320 More hands went up. 00:14:30.399 --> 00:14:32.000 You're in the right church. 00:14:32.879 --> 00:14:40.639 Because math speaks of truth, and truth speaks of God, the creator of truth. 00:14:41.279 --> 00:14:42.320 And it's happening. 00:14:42.399 --> 00:14:45.120 They do not know what to do with Darwinism. 00:14:45.919 --> 00:14:47.759 They don't know what to do. 00:14:48.240 --> 00:15:11.039 Because chance theory is dying on the vine, left and right, and these guys are freaking out because it keeps pointing to a creator God, and there's not supposed to be a creator God, and God and science aren't supposed to be mixed together, and yet all of science is pointing to the creator of science, God. 00:15:12.240 --> 00:15:14.559 And it's a revival happening, folks. 00:15:14.720 --> 00:15:18.639 They don't know what to do, they don't know what to do. 00:15:20.399 --> 00:15:27.200 Watching Amazing Grace last week on the life of William Wilberforce again for the umpteenth time. 00:15:27.279 --> 00:15:29.200 My kids reminded me of that. 00:15:30.240 --> 00:15:36.559 And I said, we've got to watch it because this is what a revolution looks like. 00:15:36.799 --> 00:15:38.639 This is what reformation looks like. 00:15:38.799 --> 00:15:44.240 We talk a lot about revival around here, and I believe revival is actually upon us, gang. 00:15:44.559 --> 00:15:54.720 There's too many things happening right now around us, with people coming to Christ and people having their bodies touched, people getting set free from the demonic. 00:15:54.799 --> 00:15:56.480 The stuff is happening left and right. 00:15:56.559 --> 00:16:01.440 I don't share most of it because I wouldn't get to my sermon. 00:16:01.840 --> 00:16:03.120 But so much is happening. 00:16:03.440 --> 00:16:12.320 It's if the Spirit of God, the presence of God is coming down, it's around us, it's happening among us, but there's got to be another step. 00:16:12.480 --> 00:16:14.799 And that other step is reformation. 00:16:15.039 --> 00:16:22.399 Reformation of society, reformation of the arts, reformation of media, reformation of business. 00:16:22.639 --> 00:16:32.559 We need young, powerful, entrepreneurial missionaries that are starting businesses for the purpose of making money for the kingdom of God. 00:16:33.600 --> 00:16:40.320 And this reformation is happening before us right now, and God's raising up this church to be a part of that. 00:16:40.480 --> 00:16:47.600 With Outlier University, with the way we do our classes and the stuff that we're doing in prayer, all of that's part of that. 00:16:48.480 --> 00:16:52.559 So I wanted to see the William Wilberforce movie again. 00:16:52.639 --> 00:16:53.120 I want to see it. 00:16:53.200 --> 00:16:54.559 If you haven't seen it, you've got to see it. 00:16:54.799 --> 00:16:56.000 Just$2.99. 00:16:56.080 --> 00:16:59.600 You can rent it, run it through your computer, into your TV, you can watch it. 00:17:00.399 --> 00:17:10.720 And here's what I love about Wilberforce is that when he got saved, I mean really saved, he was one of the most up, he was a star. 00:17:10.880 --> 00:17:17.440 He was a star in parliament in Great Britain at that time, and he was probably third or fourth in line to be prime minister. 00:17:18.559 --> 00:17:22.000 But God put in his heart two great pursuits. 00:17:22.480 --> 00:17:27.920 The first pursuit was to kill and end the slave trade. 00:17:28.400 --> 00:17:33.920 The second pursuit was what he called in his book the reformation of manners. 00:17:34.000 --> 00:17:35.200 He called it the reformation of manners. 00:17:35.279 --> 00:17:36.079 Well, here's what he meant. 00:17:36.240 --> 00:17:38.720 He meant the reformation of morals. 00:17:38.960 --> 00:17:46.640 He wanted to see all of society in Great Britain become Christian and start acting Christian. 00:17:47.359 --> 00:18:00.880 He wanted to see the kingdom of God, the reign and the rule of Christ, over issues in government, child welfare, labor laws, unions. 00:18:01.599 --> 00:18:06.720 He wanted God to show up with revival power and his presence in those areas. 00:18:06.880 --> 00:18:09.839 Men and women, should we think anything less? 00:18:10.400 --> 00:18:16.319 God has raised up the church to be the fullness of Christ, Ephesians 1 tells us. 00:18:16.480 --> 00:18:18.079 Excuse me, Ephesians 2. 00:18:18.400 --> 00:18:20.960 This fullness of Christ flowing through us. 00:18:21.119 --> 00:18:22.480 So turn to Psalm 27. 00:18:22.559 --> 00:18:24.400 I am gonna get there, I promise. 00:18:25.359 --> 00:18:43.440 But the reason I love Psalm 27 is not just because of this one thing that David speaks of here and the beauty of God, but because I like the whole narrative of what he's in when he makes this proclamation because he's actually inside a fear narrative. 00:18:43.680 --> 00:18:49.839 And I think the greatest strategy of Satan in our lives is to keep you and I in fear. 00:18:50.000 --> 00:18:56.400 Fear over our finances, fear about the future, fear about our health, fear about germs, fear about whatever. 00:18:57.200 --> 00:18:58.240 Phobias. 00:18:59.039 --> 00:19:04.960 Satan's great strategy is to make you phobic over everything. 00:19:05.119 --> 00:19:06.160 You never take risk. 00:19:06.240 --> 00:19:09.839 You never walk out by faith because you're so engulfed in fear. 00:19:10.000 --> 00:19:16.079 And so, David, man, if anybody knew fear and understood the battle with fear, it would be David. 00:19:16.160 --> 00:19:16.960 So look at verse one. 00:19:17.200 --> 00:19:21.039 He says, The Lord is my light and my salvation, whom shall I fear? 00:19:21.279 --> 00:19:24.240 So there's something he's asking himself, whom shall I fear? 00:19:24.400 --> 00:19:25.200 Is fear. 00:19:25.440 --> 00:19:29.039 The Lord is the strength of my life, of whom shall I be afraid? 00:19:29.200 --> 00:19:31.279 Of whom shall I be afraid? 00:19:31.519 --> 00:19:39.039 When the wicked come against me to eat up my flesh, my enemies and foes, they stumbled and fell. 00:19:39.279 --> 00:19:40.960 He is surrounded by enemies. 00:19:41.200 --> 00:19:44.640 He's surrounded by a fear narrative. 00:19:45.279 --> 00:19:50.799 The news wants you to live and camp out in a fear narrative. 00:19:51.680 --> 00:19:56.720 Be careful with watching too much news. 00:19:57.599 --> 00:19:59.200 Now I'm speaking to the mirror. 00:19:59.279 --> 00:20:00.400 I know everything that's going on. 00:20:00.480 --> 00:20:01.839 I can guarantee you I do. 00:20:02.000 --> 00:20:06.640 And if I take a day or two off, it is an absolute supernatural miracle. 00:20:07.039 --> 00:20:08.400 So I'm saying it to myself. 00:20:08.480 --> 00:20:20.079 But I'm finding that the less I watch the news, I mean, you need to be aware of things, because especially if we're going to be Reformation Christians who make a difference, we need to know what's going on, but we don't need to know too much of what's going on. 00:20:20.319 --> 00:20:23.359 Have you noticed it changes every day? 00:20:23.599 --> 00:20:33.680 And so as soon as you are all worried and frustrated from driving to work and you cut that guy off at the light and stuff, because you're like, eh, I can't believe those, those, I won't name any parties. 00:20:33.920 --> 00:20:35.119 Do that, you know? 00:20:35.279 --> 00:20:38.640 And then the next time you're, you know, the next day it's all been solved. 00:20:39.519 --> 00:20:41.440 And then it's a whole nother problem. 00:20:41.759 --> 00:20:56.160 Because 24-hour news needs you to watch them, to get their ratings, to get their money, to get their advertisements, so they they camp in a fear narrative, so you'll keep watching them. 00:20:56.799 --> 00:21:02.720 And some of you camp out in a fear narrative most of the time in your life. 00:21:02.799 --> 00:21:04.240 And you've got to break that. 00:21:04.400 --> 00:21:12.480 You've got these channels of your brain, of your 80,000 thoughts, that like 65% of them are fearful about stuff. 00:21:12.880 --> 00:21:15.359 So we've got to renew our minds, and that's what David does. 00:21:15.519 --> 00:21:16.880 Look at verse 3. 00:21:17.599 --> 00:21:20.720 Though an army may encamp against me, encamp. 00:21:21.119 --> 00:21:21.920 I like that. 00:21:22.079 --> 00:21:23.680 They're camping out around him. 00:21:23.839 --> 00:21:27.839 He feels like these enemies are all camping out around him. 00:21:28.240 --> 00:21:29.519 Anyone know what that's like? 00:21:29.599 --> 00:21:34.240 Where you just feel like, I mean, everything you fear is camped out right outside your door. 00:21:34.880 --> 00:21:38.640 My heart shall not fear, he says. 00:21:39.599 --> 00:21:42.640 Though war rise up against me. 00:21:43.759 --> 00:21:45.599 In this I'll be confident. 00:21:45.920 --> 00:21:52.960 He has to refocus his mind from a fear narrative to what's now going to become a beauty narrative. 00:21:53.119 --> 00:21:56.079 He's going to go from a fear narrative to a beauty narrative. 00:21:56.240 --> 00:21:59.680 And listen to this here's what I believe I believe the more you focus on beauty. 00:22:00.160 --> 00:22:01.519 The more faith you have. 00:22:01.839 --> 00:22:20.000 Now that may be a radical statement, but I believe it's true that the more you focus on the beautiful and the positive and the goodness and the grace and the healing and the supernatural love of God, the more your faith grows and the more you get out of a fear narrative. 00:22:20.319 --> 00:22:25.359 But some of you, your identity is built too much in fear. 00:22:25.599 --> 00:22:26.960 That's who you are. 00:22:27.519 --> 00:22:31.039 You're beholding fear so much that it's become you. 00:22:31.440 --> 00:22:34.880 And I'm going to challenge you that it's going to take some work. 00:22:35.440 --> 00:22:44.400 It's going to take some work for you to say to yourself, I'm not going to camp there anymore, even though my circumstances don't change. 00:22:44.720 --> 00:22:51.519 I don't think here any circumstances have changed in Psalm 27 between verse 1 and verse 3. 00:22:51.680 --> 00:22:54.319 He's saying his enemies have encamped around him. 00:22:54.480 --> 00:22:57.599 He's saying that war has encamped around him. 00:22:58.319 --> 00:22:59.519 But he's renewing his mind. 00:22:59.680 --> 00:23:00.559 You know what David's doing? 00:23:00.640 --> 00:23:02.000 He's preaching to himself. 00:23:02.640 --> 00:23:04.000 You ever preached yourself? 00:23:04.720 --> 00:23:06.400 George, you ever preached yourself? 00:23:07.359 --> 00:23:09.039 Lee, you ever preached yourself? 00:23:09.440 --> 00:23:11.200 What you do is you say, self. 00:23:12.720 --> 00:23:13.599 Shut up. 00:23:14.640 --> 00:23:15.200 Self? 00:23:17.519 --> 00:23:20.400 I'm not gonna camp out in that campground anymore. 00:23:20.960 --> 00:23:24.240 The KOA fear campground. 00:23:24.640 --> 00:23:28.319 I'm not setting up my camp, I'm not gonna set up my tent there anymore. 00:23:28.559 --> 00:23:30.559 I'm moving the trailer. 00:23:30.880 --> 00:23:32.559 You guys know about that because you got a trailer. 00:23:32.640 --> 00:23:34.000 You got a big old RV. 00:23:34.160 --> 00:23:40.640 I'm getting the RV out of the KOA fear campground, and I'm headed to the beauty campground. 00:23:40.880 --> 00:23:42.880 I'm gonna start thinking about beauty. 00:23:43.039 --> 00:23:45.200 I'm gonna I'm gonna meditate in beauty. 00:23:45.359 --> 00:23:46.720 I'm gonna love God's word. 00:23:46.960 --> 00:23:51.200 I'm gonna believe that the best days are yet in my future. 00:23:51.920 --> 00:24:01.119 And whatever mistakes I've made in the past, how many things I've messed up, or how many people I've hurt, or how many things I've done wrong, I'm gonna change that. 00:24:01.200 --> 00:24:02.640 I'm not gonna go there anymore. 00:24:02.720 --> 00:24:04.160 I'm gonna quit thinking about that. 00:24:04.319 --> 00:24:07.279 I'm gonna move out of that, and I've got a great future. 00:24:07.359 --> 00:24:13.920 And that future's in God and in his goodness and his power, and he's gonna have more of me than he had before. 00:24:14.319 --> 00:24:16.240 How many realize you don't need more of God? 00:24:16.400 --> 00:24:17.680 He needs more of you. 00:24:18.480 --> 00:24:20.160 More of God's here. 00:24:20.640 --> 00:24:26.400 He's as much here as he was at Pentecost in the book of Acts. 00:24:26.480 --> 00:24:27.440 He's as much here. 00:24:27.680 --> 00:24:29.759 He is his presence is here. 00:24:30.000 --> 00:24:40.640 What he needs is people who want his presence in their life, and you start getting enough of a group of people that are having that revival in their heart, and you will have reformation and you will have a revolution. 00:24:41.200 --> 00:24:50.640 Wilberforce built a revolution that changed Great Britain and then changed America. 00:24:51.279 --> 00:25:03.359 I've read the histories of the time, and they say that at the turn of the century, between the eighth and the 19th century and 20th century, every kid in all the schools in America knew who Wilberforce was. 00:25:04.240 --> 00:25:06.480 Nobody here talks about him now. 00:25:07.119 --> 00:25:10.960 We hear about racism every day. 00:25:11.200 --> 00:25:12.880 We hear about racism. 00:25:13.359 --> 00:25:22.960 But the greatest man who broke one of the most powerful tools of Satan to create racism in our society is forgotten because he was a Christian. 00:25:23.359 --> 00:25:24.640 But you know it. 00:25:25.519 --> 00:25:26.559 Study it. 00:25:26.720 --> 00:25:28.480 Study great men of God. 00:25:28.640 --> 00:25:30.480 Study men who've changed society. 00:25:30.720 --> 00:25:33.039 Study men who've evangelized nations. 00:25:33.200 --> 00:25:34.000 Study their lives. 00:25:34.160 --> 00:25:35.039 Read biographies. 00:25:35.200 --> 00:25:35.920 Read about them. 00:25:36.160 --> 00:25:39.039 Build up your faith and go, I want to be like that. 00:25:39.839 --> 00:25:40.880 I want to be like that. 00:25:41.039 --> 00:25:42.720 God use me in business. 00:25:42.880 --> 00:25:44.319 God use me in the arts. 00:25:44.480 --> 00:25:46.000 God use me in education. 00:25:46.160 --> 00:25:47.440 God use me in the government. 00:25:47.599 --> 00:25:51.119 God, I want to be used by you with a beauty narrative. 00:25:51.759 --> 00:25:53.359 So that's where David goes. 00:25:53.519 --> 00:25:54.559 Look at verse 4. 00:25:54.799 --> 00:26:08.880 One thing I have desired of the Lord that I will seek, that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the Lord, and to inquire in his temple. 00:26:09.200 --> 00:26:13.440 For in the time of trouble, he shall hide me in his pavilion. 00:26:13.680 --> 00:26:18.000 In the secret place of his tabernacle, he shall hide me. 00:26:18.640 --> 00:26:25.519 He shall set me high upon a rock, and now my head shall be lifted up above my enemies, all around me. 00:26:25.599 --> 00:26:26.559 So they're still around him. 00:26:26.720 --> 00:26:28.799 His circumstances haven't changed. 00:26:29.119 --> 00:26:34.880 Therefore, I will offer sacrifices of joy in his tabernacle. 00:26:35.119 --> 00:26:39.200 I will sing as I will sing praises to the Lord. 00:26:39.440 --> 00:26:41.119 This is a beauty narrative. 00:26:41.200 --> 00:26:43.519 He's camping out in a beauty narrative. 00:26:43.680 --> 00:26:45.519 He's leaving the fear narrative. 00:26:45.680 --> 00:26:46.960 He's focusing his mind. 00:26:47.039 --> 00:26:48.799 He's refocusing his thinking. 00:26:49.039 --> 00:26:57.920 The thoughts, the emotions of his brain are cutting new channels in his frontal cortex. 00:26:58.160 --> 00:27:01.200 And he's deciding I'm going after beauty. 00:27:01.440 --> 00:27:05.519 And then what happens is God raises him up above his problems. 00:27:05.680 --> 00:27:07.599 God raises him up above his enemies. 00:27:07.759 --> 00:27:08.720 God raises him up. 00:27:08.880 --> 00:27:09.920 God gives him solutions. 00:27:10.000 --> 00:27:12.319 He starts knowing things he shouldn't know. 00:27:12.720 --> 00:27:25.759 That's why I believe reformation in all of these different eras and spheres of society, whether it be business, whether it be the arts, whether it be media, whether it be government, education, family, marriage, it should be, it's going to be believers. 00:27:26.000 --> 00:27:29.839 It's believers that are going to do it because we're going to hear from the Holy Spirit. 00:27:30.000 --> 00:27:36.319 You're going to have beauty flowing through your veins, and you're going to have solutions that nobody else has. 00:27:36.480 --> 00:27:54.240 Our greatest scientists are the youngsters right now coming up who are hearing this message, and they're going to go into the hard sciences, and they're going to go into sociology, and they're going to go into these other areas and disciplines, and they're going to bring the beauty of God there because God's already there. 00:27:54.960 --> 00:27:55.839 God's already there. 00:27:56.000 --> 00:27:58.319 He just needs some people to discover him there. 00:27:58.799 --> 00:28:00.640 He's already at your work. 00:28:01.440 --> 00:28:07.440 But as you begin to refocus your mind into the beauty of God and say, God, I want to see your beauty. 00:28:07.519 --> 00:28:09.599 I want to experience your beauty in my life. 00:28:09.839 --> 00:28:13.839 He will start to bring a revolution in your thinking and a revival in your heart. 00:28:14.240 --> 00:28:17.359 A revolution in your thinking and a revival in your heart. 00:28:17.680 --> 00:28:24.000 Look at verses 13 and 14, where he kind of gives us a result of this new mindset. 00:28:24.559 --> 00:28:33.279 I would have lost heart unless I had believed that I would see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. 00:28:33.599 --> 00:28:35.119 Wait on the Lord. 00:28:35.680 --> 00:28:39.039 Be of good courage, and he shall strengthen your heart. 00:28:39.200 --> 00:28:42.799 Wait, I say, wait on the Lord. 00:28:44.079 --> 00:28:45.680 Beauty has a name. 00:28:46.960 --> 00:28:49.680 David discovered that that beauty was in goodness. 00:28:50.640 --> 00:28:53.440 The goodness of the Lord and the land of the living. 00:28:53.519 --> 00:28:54.799 You know why he said that? 00:28:55.440 --> 00:29:03.759 Because he didn't want anyone who would read this poem to think he's talking about the land of the dying. 00:29:04.720 --> 00:29:10.160 Because we all believe, as Jesus followers, that it's going to be good in heaven. 00:29:10.319 --> 00:29:12.000 It's going to be better in heaven. 00:29:12.240 --> 00:29:16.240 Some of us are a little more closer to that than others. 00:29:16.960 --> 00:29:18.799 So we think more about it. 00:29:19.039 --> 00:29:21.759 But he's saying it's in the land of the living. 00:29:22.400 --> 00:29:27.039 Right now, he wants us to experience the goodness of the Lord. 00:29:27.359 --> 00:29:32.319 Right now, he wants us to experience the beauty of his goodness. 00:29:33.920 --> 00:29:37.680 So we have a choice. 00:29:38.640 --> 00:29:47.839 Fear or faith, man or God, circumstances or outcomes, problems or solutions. 00:29:48.720 --> 00:29:51.440 Second Corinthians 3, Paul says this. 00:29:51.920 --> 00:30:10.079 But we all with unveiled faces, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, comma, just as by the Spirit of God. 00:30:10.480 --> 00:30:16.160 So David is beholding the glory of God, and he's becoming the glory of God. 00:30:16.880 --> 00:30:23.519 You see, the beauty of God in Scripture is defined as glory, the glory of God. 00:30:24.000 --> 00:30:32.000 So when we behold the beauty of God, we're beholding the glory of God, and as we behold the glory of God, we become the glory of God. 00:30:32.400 --> 00:30:34.319 Become like what you behold. 00:30:35.200 --> 00:30:40.319 So I want to do just challenge you on three things here, three things to study, three things to consider. 00:30:41.440 --> 00:30:43.920 Number one, the glory supreme. 00:30:44.480 --> 00:30:47.519 The glory supreme, which is God's beauty. 00:30:48.000 --> 00:30:49.920 Study the gospel story. 00:30:50.160 --> 00:30:54.799 Like read through Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John again and meditate on the red. 00:30:55.200 --> 00:30:58.000 Meditate on the red and read the black. 00:30:58.720 --> 00:31:03.440 Look at the black and meditate on the red, if you have one of those kind of Bibles. 00:31:03.680 --> 00:31:08.880 But meditate on the words of God and say, God, reveal your beauty through this story. 00:31:09.200 --> 00:31:10.960 Meditate on the gospel story. 00:31:11.119 --> 00:31:15.680 Meditate on what Christ did through his life, death, and resurrection. 00:31:15.839 --> 00:31:19.279 Secondly, crown of the cosmos. 00:31:19.519 --> 00:31:20.559 Jot that down. 00:31:20.799 --> 00:31:24.000 Study the crown of the cosmos. 00:31:24.480 --> 00:31:27.039 The crown of the cosmos are people. 00:31:28.000 --> 00:31:34.559 Study people, great men of God, with great characters, with great virtue, that did great things. 00:31:34.720 --> 00:31:35.200 Study them. 00:31:35.680 --> 00:31:38.319 Dubay calls them the crown of the cosmos. 00:31:38.640 --> 00:31:42.960 We are the highest of all creation. 00:31:44.319 --> 00:31:51.200 Camels and horses and elephants don't build buildings. 00:31:52.160 --> 00:31:55.359 Bears eat people. 00:31:59.039 --> 00:32:00.720 But they don't wear clothes. 00:32:00.880 --> 00:32:04.960 They don't have, there's not a fashion line from the bears. 00:32:06.079 --> 00:32:09.200 Only we, we're the only ones who are creative. 00:32:09.440 --> 00:32:14.559 We are creative beings, the highest of all creation, the crown of the cosmos. 00:32:14.720 --> 00:32:15.839 Study that. 00:32:16.160 --> 00:32:20.480 And then thirdly, God's divine art gallery. 00:32:20.720 --> 00:32:26.960 Get out into creation and experience worship through being in God's beauty. 00:32:27.119 --> 00:32:29.279 Three books I'd recommend that you read. 00:32:29.359 --> 00:32:32.079 I talked about this the last time, but I decided to bring a copy. 00:32:32.160 --> 00:32:34.880 I'm going to lay them on the stage if anybody wants to take a picture of him. 00:32:34.960 --> 00:32:44.400 The first is Madame Jean Guyan, great mystic of the 16th century, who wrote Experiencing the Depths of Jesus Christ. 00:32:44.559 --> 00:32:48.319 And I just consider this one of the great Christian writings of all time. 00:32:49.359 --> 00:32:57.359 One thing by Sam Storms, pastor and friend of mine in Oklahoma City, developing a passion for the beauty of God. 00:32:57.519 --> 00:33:00.000 And you can see that one's like an easy read. 00:33:00.559 --> 00:33:07.839 Now, for all the scholars in the room and you guys who want to dig deep, this is the one I just finished to my chagrin. 00:33:08.319 --> 00:33:16.079